Techie Tuesday: Ocean Currents Could Power Half the Homes in Florida

Todd Janca’s father ran the Discovery Bay Marine Laboratory in Mona, Jamaica, and Todd learned that at great depths submarine have to fight strong ocean currents.

“Along the way, it just dawned on me that no one is using all the energy that is down there,” he says. “You can collect the energy from [an ocean current] and you aren’t using anything up.”

According to the CS Monitor:

So this year, Janca started Crowd Energy, a company that is looking to build large underwater turbines to harness ocean currents. Crowd Energy, based in Zephyrhills, Fla., plans on making turbines with 100-foot-tall propellers located 300 feet below the ocean’s surface and miles from shore.

In addition to ensuring that no animals will be harmed by the physical turbine, Janca is trying to make the turbine as quiet as possible to minimize harmonics, which can affect animal life.